PASMA Use Collage to Represent Black Excellence throughout the Years

The UJ branch of PASMA displayed a collage of images to celebrate some of history’s most prolific black figures outside the Student Centre at APK on Friday.

“This is just to say that we have black excellence in terms of authors, scholars and heroes,” said the chairperson of the PASMA UJ branch, Tebogo Serala. “The society is giving us a misinterpretation of our history as people.”

The images depicted the oppression of black people dating as far back as the transatlantic slave trade. Leaders of black liberation movements from across the world were featured in the display, including Thomas Sankara and Steve Biko.

Serala said that he felt black history was not taken seriously. “We live in a society that tries to eliminate the history of black people.”

Collection of images celebrating afrocentrism.

Collage depicting the “sheroes” of black history. Photo by Gaby Ndongo.

One person who preferred to remain anonymous said that there was a need for such initiatives as racial discrimination was still prevalent on the continent.

“The displays are good for [helping] us to remember our history; but for the current generation, it has the ability to produce hatred,” the source said. “Everyone now needs to participate in order for this to not happen again.”

A member of the PASMA, Vhuhwavho Dzhivhuho said that the choice to use pictures to send a message was deliberate.

“Images are very powerful; at times, people should see their reality through images,” Dzhivhuho said.

“In psychology, they’ll tell you that insane people run away from reality. It shows us our sickness; we are here to heal that sickness,” he added.

Serala shared Dzhivhuho’s sentiments. “Basically what we are doing is just dismantling the nature of psychological, racial violence and what it has done or the impact it has had on black people as a whole,” he said.

The display served as the final part of the ‘Black Psychology week’ hosted by PASMA, which took place every day of this week between 15:30 and17:30.

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Gaby Ndongo Nkolo is a liberal Congolese nationalist who is currently studying Journalism at the University of Johannesburg. He works as a journalist for both The Open Journal and The Journalist.
His interests are diverse ranging from skateboarding, boxing, the culinary arts, cycling and most importantly journalism which brought with it, interests in reading and writing. In particular Gaby enjoys activities that require speed or concentration; however, music beguiles his soul and rejuvenates his mind.
This individual’s aspiration is to always be his true self and love who he is as a person; additionally, he aims to appreciate people for who they are as individuals.

The reason why it will never die is because black people and their importance will never be erase. Therefore, any form of maltreatment against such people will always resonate in the minds of those who share the same kind of importance.